You may think that when private-equity firms buy troubled companies, their plan for making a profit is to fix them up, then resell them. But often, the heart of their plan is to load the companies up with debt, siphon hundreds of millions of dollars out of them, and stick the next set of investors with the bill.

The boneheaded move of the week was committed by financial journalists, who collectively decided to blame Netflix's recent price hike for its reduction in subscriber targets -- a bad call indeed. Other head-scratchers included the end of boastful Fidelity Magellan chief Harry Lange's tenure, Cracker Barrel's attempts to evade Biglari Holdings, and Restoration Hardware's IPO.